Environment

On the environmental front, Standard Chartered Bank enforces environmental practices at work through awareness campaigns such as recycling programmes, energy saving programmes and other green practices.

Standard Chartered Bank Brunei working in partnership with WWF, donated USD500,000 towards the Heart of Borneo Brunei project.

The first Heart of Borneo project to be allocated the funding is the rehabilitation of Borneo’s degraded peatland forests – a significant and relevant choice given Borneo’s current condition where a vast majority of peatland forests are severely degraded and an important step in reducing CO2 emissions. Peatland forests are very important in mitigating climate change. They are huge carbon stores and in their natural state accumulate carbon from the atmosphere like a sponge absorbing water. The danger of losing peatlands is that once the swamps are drained for the purposes of logging or agriculture, the peat will decompose and release the stored CO2 into the air. The carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere from peatland drainage and fires in South East Asia is a major global contributor to climate change that we are experiencing now. Drained peatland swamps are also very susceptible to fire and are major contributors to the haze that envelopes parts of Borneo Island during dry periods.

This project will be undertaken in partnership with the British High Commission. The second project to be explored is a Biodiversity Survey of the Sungai Ingei protection forest, leading to a better understanding of the present state of wildlife in the forest, the existence of any new species, and new ways of preserving these.